Math is Money
by Tell-Me-Tales
Summary: Filbrick Pines is well aware that he is far from the perfect father. However, just because Filbrick isn't perfect, doesn't mean the man gives up so easily. He's too stubborn for that by far. Shame it's always something of a coin toss as to if the lessons he teaches his sons will help or harm them in the long run. [AO3 CrossPost]
1. One Way to Spend an Afternoon

**Glass Shard Beach, NJ**  
 **September 20, 1958**

It's a Saturday. Normally, that would mean today would be one of the busier days in the shop, _but_ it's also September. School just started a few weeks ago, bringing an end to most of the extra business brought in thanks to the pawnshop's location close to the shore. There should be a considerable increase in customers coming in to browse through the offered wares given a few more weeks; but, for now, business is likely to remain slow and quiet. And so, Filbrick Pines finds himself watching his youngest son explore the displays around the shop while Maude disappears for an afternoon spent in the local library with the boy's two older brothers.

The man leans against the counter on which the cash register resides and considers, not for the first time, the most recent bit of drama his wife has created over their youngest two children. Frankly put, it's all of three weeks into the boys' school career, and Stanford has already and quite obviously outpaced Stanley. Filbrick remains unconvinced that this is a bad thing, but Maude worries and an upset wife is enough reason to at least look into the situation.

Over the past week, Filbrick has dug through whatever old reports from Sherman's early school days that he could find. The best he can piece together, Stanley is more or less where he is expected to be. It's just that _Stanford_ is so quick to learn that he's surpassing any reasonable expectations for a child his age.

Yesterday, he'd arranged to be the one to pick the boys up from school, rather than Maude. After sending his sons to the car he'd had a quick chat with their teacher. She'd been surprised when he'd immediately asked about Stanley's performance in class as opposed to Stanford's advanced work. A few more sentences exchanged and he'd had his suspicions confirmed. Unfortunately, that didn't help him with Maude's continued fretting.

So, here he is today, contemplating a shouldn't-be-a-problem that has nevertheless managed to become a problem.

He isn't about to tell any of his sons that they're not allowed to work hard or do their best. If Stanford's successes make Stanley's own attempts seem lacking, then that's just too bad. _Except_. Except that still leaves Maude anxious and unhappy over the whole thing. Back to square one.

Well, Filbrick supposes that means he's left with just one solution: if he isn't willing to slow one twin's progress in order to shrink the margin between the two, he'll have to see if he can do something about speeding along the other twin's progress instead.

"Stanley," he calls, "Come here."

"Okay."

"That's 'Yes, Sir,'" Filbrick corrects.

Stanley frowns, but he obediently repeats the phrase, "Yes, Sir."

"Good," Filbrick says before dragging the tall stool he keeps behind the counter over to his right side, "Now, up you go."

Stanley giggles as his father picks him up and then deposits him on top of the stool. "What are we doing?"

"You're going to show me what you've been learning at school."

"Aw," the boy whines. Filbrick slides a small notepad and a pen in front of the child.

"None of that," the man tells his son, "This is important."

Stanley pouts, poking the pen with one finger but not picking it up. "Ask Ford. He does it better."

"I'm aware of that. I want you to show me what _you_ have learned. Not your brother."

Stanley frowns. "But I'm dumb."

"Excuse me?" Filbrick hadn't been expecting that response.

"I'm dumb," Stanley says again. "Ford's comin' home with books. To read ta Ma! And I can't 'member what sounds the letters make."

"That's 'remember,'" Filbrick corrects automatically.

Stanley's whole face contorts oddly in frustration for a moment, but soon settles on an expression that quite clearly says, 'See? I am dumb!' The boy repeats the word dutifully, if in a miserable tone, "Remember."

"You're average," comes the next correction.

Stanley's face scrunches up in confusion this time. "What's av'rage?"

"That's 'average.' And it means you're like everyone else."

"But Ford -"

"Is smart," Filbrick finishes the sentence firmly. "You should be proud of your brother."

"But -"

"No buts. I doubt anyone else in your class is reading besides Stanford."

Stanley stops, thinks, and then, "No, jus' Ford."

"Because Stanford is smart."

"So..." the boy thinks some more before saying, "My class is dumb?"

Filbrick opens his mouth but nothing comes out. He snaps it closed a second later, lets his eyelids slip shut, and rubs his left temple. _'The boy is too much like Maude,'_ he thinks, _'Can't win an argument against either of them.'_

The man lowers his hand and looks down at his small, confused six-year-old. After a few seconds spent staring, he says, "No. Your class is normal and average. You are normal and average. Stanford is just smart."

Stanley blinks. "Oh."

Whether that means Stanley finally understands or not, Filbrick doesn't know. Regardless, the man is more than ready to leave this conversation behind. The boy will figure it out eventually. Probably.

"I was more interested in what you had learned for math, anyway," Filbrick says. Let the actual teachers deal with the headache of explaining the English language, with its various rules and their many, many exceptions.

Stanley's answering, melodramatic huff of a sigh smacks of Maude's influence. The boy crosses his arms on the counter and slumps forward to rest his chin on his forearms. "Ford's better at that, too."

Filbrick resists the desire to express his own frustrations by punching something. "We're not talking about Stanford right now; we're talking about you."

"But -"

"No buts," Filbrick snaps and then goes on, "This conversation is not about Stanford. This conversation is not about comparing you and Stanford. This conversation is about you - just you - and what you have been learning at school."

Stanley flinches at his father's obvious displeasure but soon frowns in thought as the words sink in. "Just me?" he asks.

The man sighs and rubs at his left temple again as he struggles to rein his irritation back under an impassive facade. "Just you."

"But -" Filbrick crosses his arms and Stanley cuts himself off. "Just me!" he squeaks.

"Now that we've established that this conversation is about _Stanley_ Pines..." the man grumbles more to himself than the child in front of him. He goes on to say in a louder, clearer voice, "How high have you learned to count?"

Stanley brightens. "I'm good at counting! We counted all the way up to a hundred every day this week, an' I can do it without making any mistakes an' everything!"

Filbrick nods. "That's good," he says, "What about addition? Have they started teaching that yet?"

"Oh." And just like that, Stanley's enthusiasm is again doused. "Yeah, but I'm not as good at putting the numbers together. I'm better at counting."

"Well? Show me what you can do," the pawnshop owner insists. He gestures to the neglected pen and paper expectantly.

Stanley looks down at the items with a frown. "But it's blank. There's no numbers to solve."

"Hmph. That's fixed easily enough." Filbrick grabs the pen and writes down a few simple math problems. He forces himself to write slowly enough that the numbers can actually be read by someone else. "Alright, what do you make of these?"

Stanley squints at the paper. "These are easy ones!" he exclaims after he's able to decipher his father's penmanship - or lack thereof. The six-year-old accepts the pen from his father and starts to carefully form his own wobbling numbers on the paper.

Filbrick looks the answers over once Stanley is finished. "Good. You got them all right. Let's see if you can do a few harder ones now."

"Harder?" Stanley asks, shifting nervously on the high stool.

"That's right," Filbrick says without looking up from his writing, "You said the last ones were easy and you answered all of them correctly. That means you're ready for new, more advanced material."

"Oh." The word comes out small and intimidated. Filbrick doesn't notice.

"Alright," the man says as he flips back to the topmost page left on the half used notepad, having filled several pages with increasingly difficult problems, "Try these."

"Okay."

"That's 'Yes, Sir.'"

"Yes, Sir." Stanley looks at the numbers on the first page and relaxes. "These are easy, too!"

"Get started," Filbrick instructs his son, "We'll see if you still think they're easy by the end of them." The man disappears into the pawnshop's back room only to reappear moments later with a project of his own to keep busy with while Stanley puzzles out the addition problems in front of him.

* * *

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	2. Making Cents of Numbers

Filbrick sets the fork he just finished polishing next to the other ones he's already worked on. At this point, he's managed to get through half the set of silver. If his suspicions are correct, however, he'll have to polish the remaining half some other time.

The man turns to look at his son, and, as he expected, Stanley is decidedly _not_ working on the addition problems Filbrick gave him to solve. Instead, Stanley is doodling small pictures along the edge of the page, humming absently and swinging his feet between the legs of the stool he's perched on.

"Stanley."

The boy immediately freezes and the tuneless ditty comes to an abrupt end. The six-year-old peeks up at his father through his bangs. "Yeah, Dad?"

"That's not working on your math."

"I am!" he denies quickly, "I did - One, two, three... - four whole pages! And -"

"You're bored," Filbrick says bluntly.

Stanley chances another glance at the man before looking over at a very interesting display on the wall to his right. "No..."

Filbrick scowls. "What have I told you about lying?"

"...Okay. I'm bored," the boy admits slowly, only to quickly tack on, "But I think I did really good on the ones I did!"

Filbrick nods and holds his hand out. "Let me see."

The first two-and-a-half pages are full of steady, reliable work, but after that a noticeable trend begins and rapidly grows more common over the remaining page-and-a-half. Several of the addition problems have two different answers written down. One of the answers, typically the first, better positioned answer, is scribbled over by a few quick lines; the other answer, usually the second, awkwardly positioned answer, is written several times over - one on top of the other - effectively thickening the lines of ink in an attempt to draw the eye away from the previous mistake. The chosen answer is always correct.

On the fourth page, the numbers start to take on their own little additions in the form eyes, and hats, and other silly drawings. The last problem Stanley bothered solving had a seven for the answer, and somehow that seven had become the bow of a crudely rendered sailboat. The outside margins of the page are covered in similar childish attempts at art.

"Why do you have more than one answer for some of these?"

Stanley hunches his shoulders. "Ford says you're s'posed to double-check your numbers, 'n' I didn' get 'em all right the firs' time."

"Stanford taught you that?" Filbrick asks. The boy nods hesitantly. "Your brother is right. It's a good practice to keep." Filbrick spares a thought for rewarding Stanford in some small way, but right now Stanley is the son in front of him and Stanley will be the one he remains focused on until the rest of the family returns from their afternoon trip. "And you got every answer correct because of it." The child brightens a bit. "But this last page looks more like art class than math."

"Sorry, Sir," the six-year-old mumbles, eyes trained on his knees.

Filbrick nods once and places his hand on top of the boy's head for brief a moment. "A person's attention tends to wander when they're bored," he concedes. "How about we make things a little more interesting, then?" The man reaches around his son to press a button on the cash register. The drawer springs open with a sharp _ding!_ and Filbrick plucks out the change compartment before pushing the drawer closed. The coins make a short clattering sound as he sets the long, segregated bin down. "What have they taught you about money in school?"

Stanley stares at the coins with a furrowed brown. "Um... Those are pennies, and nickels, and quarters - No! Dimes! The big ones are quarters. Sorry."

Filbrick nods along. "Anything else?"

Stanley looks down and kicks his feet, one small hand held to his chin in thought. Eventually, he is forced to admit defeat and looks back up at his father. "...No?"

"That's alright," the man says, "Money's simple enough if you can count to one-hundred. Gives you a chance to learn something before Stanford, too."

Stanley's eyes go wide. "Really?"

Filbrick shrugs. "Unless he's picked it up from somewhere else." He raises his eyebrows and immediately receives a response to the question he never technically asked.

Stanley shakes his head and says, "No. I don' think so, anyway."

Filbrick flips to the next clean page of the small notebook and sets in down on the countertop. He places one each of the four different coins on the paper and writes their value beside them.

"I really get to learn something afore Ford?"

Filbrick slides the notebook closer to Stanley and puts the pen away. "That's 'before,'" he corrects.

"Before," comes the dutiful reply, much quicker than it has been all day.

The man smirks slightly at the child practically bouncing on the stool. "Learning isn't restricted to school and neither is teaching. Now, pay attention.

"A penny is worth one cent," he begins and taps a finger on the spiralled binding of the little book in order to bring his son's focus where it belongs, "You can use money to buy all kinds of things, but let's say we went to that candy store at the end of the street. Do you know why they call them 'penny candies,' Stanley?" The boy shakes his head. "Because they cost one cent each, which is the same amount as one penny. So, if you had a penny, you could buy a piece of candy."

Stanley's eyes have gone wide again. "Candy?"

"That's right. Every cent is worth one piece of candy," the man states, "Now, a nickel is worth five cents - or candies. A dime is worth ten, and a quarter is worth twenty-five."

Over the course of the afternoon, Filbrick ends up introducing his son to more than one new concept. They start with adding pennies together, and it isn't long before the odd nickel starts being used. Stanley stumbles once or twice before he remembers that the different coin is worth more than the smaller copper ones he's been working with. After throwing a dime into the equation, Filbrick is confronted with the fact that the students in Stanley's class haven't yet been taught how to do equations that add up to anything over nine. A gruff, no-nonsense explanation about zeroes and working in multiple digits follows. Eventually, Filbrick presents an addition problem with a dime, two nickels, and some pennies thrown in and Stanley struggles for over two minutes before complaining about three different coins being used at the same time. That's about when the man realizes that he may have gotten a bit overly ambitious. He teaches Stanley how to exchange the more valuable coins for pennies and the boy counts the new pile of pennies one at a time to get his answer.

Maude, Sherman, and Stanford Pines return home just in time to hear Stanley's triumphant finish, "-ty-five, twenty-six... Twenty-seven!"

* * *

 **Read chapters sooner on Archive of Our Own:** **archiveofourown dot org slash works slash 8344027**

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